This reclassification renders the genus Metasepia obsolete[2] Paintpot cuttlefish are a slow-moving, bottom-dwelling species in the neritic zone found at a depth of 20 to 100 meters in subtropical climates.

The paintpot cuttlefish's chromatophores are mostly set to be darkly colored with bright yellow spots on the head, dorsal side of mantle, and arms.

[citation needed] Like its sister species, the paintpot cuttlefish lives directly on the benthos; its buoyancy regulating organ, the cuttlebone, is too small to efficiently lift it off the seabed; thus it walks on its tentacles and protrusions of its mantle.

Freshly hatched cuttlefish, which resemble miniature adults, migrate to 80 meters depth in sandy-mud areas from August to September to grow and develop, after which the mature squid moves towards the shallows to spawn.

Cuttlefish have a mode of color change typified by dark bands traveling across the animal's body in a coordinated pattern called "passing clouds".

[6] The paintpot cuttlefish is especially conducive to this kind of research due to their small size, slow speed and the frequency of the passing clouds display.

This may indicate that cephalopods may have a central nervous system similar to humans which can lead to larger implications in neuroscience.